In 2002, I was studying abroad in Germany. Our program was headquartered in Munich. Early on, before we started our classes, the professors told us that we would be visiting Dachau. If you’ve never been to Munich, I can tell you that the city has a remarkable subway – it’s clean, it’s well organized, easy to get around in, and the trains come on time. And if the professors had not planned the trip, I might never have noticed that there in the middle of the S2 (the green line) – there was the stop for Dachau. It felt most strange to buy a train ticket to Dachau. Dachau itself is a bustling little suburb of Munich – people live and work and play there. When our group boarded the subway, you could see in a moment who was going to Dachau and why: solemn, tight faces, anticipating great sadness sat next to distractible, comfortable people just on their way home.
The concentration camp was mostly destroyed in the years after the war, but a few buildings were preserved. As we walked from the train to the camp, the fall air was crisp and cool. The sky was a bit gray, which seemed fitting, but sometimes the sun came out anyway. Leaves rustled, the occasional bird sang, and none of it felt real. The only way I could ever think to describe the whole experience is with a reference to “The Shining.” The little boy, Danny, asks the hotel’s head chef if he’s scared of the hotel. The chef says he isn’t, but Danny asks him if there’s something bad here. The chef says, “Well…you know, Doc, when something happens, it can leave a trace of itself behind. Say like, if someone burns toast. Well, maybe things that happen leave other kinds of traces behind….I think a lot of things happened right here in this hotel over the years…and not all of ‘em was good.”
Being at the camp was like sensing the burnt toast of the place. All of the misery and sorrow seemed to accumulate and it hit me in waves as we walked along. The trace of all that evil clung to the ground and urged you to notice – not because the evil was powerful, but because its stain was still so noticeable.
When I think about those few hours that I visited that camp, it feels like an encounter with the holy. It was like so much evil was done in that place that the veil became thinner and God chose to shine through all the more. It was like the pain that I could feel was amplified by the pain God felt when so many did so much wrong day after day after day.
It would be reassuring if we could say that the Nazis rose to power, but Christians immediately recognized the great evil and resisted its temptation. But we know that’s not how it happened. As the Nazis became more powerful, many protestants in Germany became members of the German Christian movement (they were pro-Nazi Christians). They believed in racist ideals; they called on the churches to remove the Old Testament from the Bible and a lot of Paul’s letters; they proclaimed that Jesus was an Aryan hero; and they wanted the church to be subject to Nazi control. They criticized traditional Christianity’s focus on Jesus’ birth, life, suffering, sacrifice, and other-worldly redemption – saying that that was passive and negative. The Aryan Jesus was a fighter and was linked to the strength of German blood and unity. Yes, there were Christians who rose up against this terrifying, toxic theology – Christians who discerned Christ’s lordship over all, not favoring one nation’s blood over others. They formed the Confessing Church and were true heroes of Christian history. But historians estimate that there were only about 3,000 of them.
The dramatic majority of Christians during Hitler’s rule chose not to take a side. The bulk of people who claimed to follow Christ either trusted in Hitler as Lord or thought that their holy calling meant waiting for God to sort things out (if they saw a problem at all).
In Advent, we carve time out of the year to remember that we are waiting – to remember the hopeful anticipation of Jesus’ day of glory… The church under Hitler was waiting, but most were not waiting in holiness. The scars of their inaction still dot the European landscape. Through the horrors of war, persecution, and blood shed, God heard the cries of those who suffered and God rose up heroes to conquer Nazi control. God’s intervention in stopping Hitler, in liberating the camps – that was miraculous; but the church’s disorder and cowardice – that is our great shame. God’s holiness overcame those Christians’ unwillingness to be truly awake.1
[1] https://www.mvv-muenchen.de/fileadmin/mediapool/03-Plaene_Bahnhoefe/Netzplaene/2018_MVVnetz_Final_S_U_R_screen.pdf &
https://www.gradesaver.com/the-shining/study-guide/quotes &
https://ghdi.ghi-dc.org/sub_image.cfm?image_id=2059 &
https://www.colorado.edu/history/sites/default/files/attached-files/lucca_thesis.pdf &
https://germanhistorydocs.org/en/nazi-germany-1933-1945/dietrich-bonhoeffer-1939